Please Help! Serious problem with Toshiba

I know this Toshiba MX35 is no where near capable of handling what I need it to do. It just wasn't designed for the applications I want to run. It has 256MB of RAM, the processor is 1.6 If I remember right. It was here on the base, and I got a deal cause it was the demo model. In the glass case, not out ontop of the shelf for people to play with. Anyway, I defragged the drive, went to msconfig and closed all other unwanted applications, cleaned out all temp. files, cookies, ect, run spyware, adware, and virus scans. I rebooted after each of these tasks. The computer boots quickly, however it's to the point it won't even play a disc without freezing. If I go to task manager to close the program, it just sits there and does nothing. The only reason I care, is because I have a NP9890 on it way (shipped out the 24th) and I want to take Premiere Pro, Photoshop, Engine Simulations, and other programs and save them so I can transfer them over to the Sager. This thing will do nothing but freeze. I've gotten online prior, and got all Norton and Microsoft updates and patches. This is where my computer knowlege stops, and my temper starts. And I have to tell you, although I despise this MX35, it takes a serious beating. It's been thrown around the room, dropped on purpose, the lid as been slammed closed several time, I once got mad at it and punched the keyboard. The Q key came off, but some how snapped back into place perfectly. I've thrown the mouse at the screen, and there's no dead pixels. No I know what your thinking...I need anger management. Well, I have lost alot of work and on several instances had to start completley over because of this thing freezing to the point where I had to remove the battery to get it to restart. I will now also have an ecternal drive for backup. I've gone to the Toshiba site and searched for updates, nothing. I guess the RAM card on this model isn't even upgradable. I put in a DVD or CD, and the computer doesn't even recognize it. And these are DVD's from the states, not Hajee copies (if your in Iraq you'll know what this means) Now opening even "my computer" will make it freeze. Winamp is slow and choppy at best. Forget Windows Movie Maker. Adobe is not even possible.
Figuring maybe I could go online and get new driver's? Nope. I even unisntalled media player 10 and reinstalled it, nothing. Maybe the drive? But when I use my external DVD drive, it does the same thing. Nero, PowerDVD, WMP, all of them freeze. I don't get it. I'm at the mercy of this thing and I don't know what to do. Don't get me wrong, It's durable and fine for emailing or burning cd's. If I can get this figured out, I'll send it home so my girlfriend so she can use it for school. Any ideas or suggestions? If you need any more info on what it's doing, just ask and i will try to answer everything as much as I possibly can. I'm thinking about just reinstalling windows, but I need to be able to get my stuff off this thing first. Thanks for any help you may offer!

I only turned off the start up applications. Will this be a factor?

I went back to msconfig and all applications and process are enabled. I even disabled all and then reabled just to be sure and rebooted. No changes. I put in a disc, and the drive will start to read it, but nothing opens, so I open the window for the drive and the box is empty, as if it was a blank disc. Just clicking on "My computer" it will freeze. I can't even click on any items in the tool bar. All cookies have been deleted, all temp files erased. I also defragged, and ran Ad-ware, Spy-ware, and Virus full systems scans. Still no change. Any suggestions? My 9890 has arrived in the states, and the average time it takes a package to get here is about 8 days, so the clock is ticking. Hopefully I can get my programs off if this laptop and install them onto the Sager. Another problem is burning. I will burn audio and video on a brand new blank disc, the program goes thru the motions, and takes the usual time to record. However, when it is finished, there is nothing on the disc. Usually I can look on the disc to see if anything has been burnt to it, and there are no marks. The correct disc drive is assigned thru the programs. It makes no difference if I use Nero, Sonic, or media player, nothing gets on the disc.

it will read discs here and there, but it's a majority of the that I have to try it two or three times to get it to work and it runs very very slow